Coming, Ready or Not
by Rumour of an Alchemist
Summary: A look at Neville Longbottom on the morning of September the first, 1991, as he steels himself before setting out for the Hogwarts Express. Teaser piece, presenting background material for my 'Saint Potter' crossover story. Alternate Universe. Reference to non-canonical canon characters and events.


Disclaimer: I am not J. K. Rowling. I do not own Harry Potter. I am not Leslie Charteris. I do not own The Saint.

Note: The following is, in the same fashion as 'Gearing Up', by way of a teaser/piece of background material for the 'Saint Potter' crossover story I'm working on, and takes a look at Neville Longbottom's on the morning of September the first, 1991, as he steels himself before setting out for the Hogwarts Express.

This story is set in an alternate universe which was impacted by The Saint, and some characters and events have diverged from canon.

* * *

When Xenophilius Lovegood got himself trampled to death by a common or garden variety of a snorkack on the Ides of May in 1989 (whilst looking for evidence of the existence of the more exotic crumple-horned variety) and his grieving widow inherited his estate, he inadvertently did Neville Longbottom a huge favour.

Out went _The Quibbler_, the publication the rather eccentric Xenophilius had overseen. In came _Monster Hunter's Monthly_, a periodical published by the distraught Lovegood widow, focusing almost exclusively on magical creatures, how dangerous they were, where they lived, and how to hunt, trap, and destroy them. Before the death of her husband prompted her abrupt career change, the Lovegood widow had carried out spell research and she knew the value of thorough testing of methods and facts – and of accurate reporting. A couple of years after the last ever issue of _The Quibbler_ released and the first issue of its successor hit wizarding Britain, the editor of _Monster Hunter's Monthly_ and her core team of writers were established as respected sages in their field.

Neville had insisted his gran get him a lifetime subscription to _Monster Hunter's Monthly_, not least because it could be relied upon to have some feature or column about werewolves every few issues – and Neville therefore considered the magazine essential reading with regard to his own long-term plans and goals. Neville's parents had never been traitors, Neville was certain, and that meant that somewhere along the line, a hostile werewolf had been involved in what had happened to them. Neville Longbottom was going to do his darnedest to find out just who that werewolf had been, and if necessary ensure that any overdue justice was served – although before he was _quite_ ready for that, he was first going to have to go to school and learn a lot of useful, practical, things.

It was the Sunday, the first of September, 1991, now, and the first day of the rest of Neville Longbottom's life. Today Neville Longbottom was off to Hogwarts. He had his cherry wood and dragon heartstring wand tucked into the specially sewn pocket in his robes, his small practice-crossbow oiled and wrapped securely at the bottom of his trunk along with one of the last photos ever taken of his parents, and he had notified the editor of _Monster Hunter's Monthly_ of his change of address for the next few months, so that she could send his subscription directly to him, and save his gran the bother of forwarding deliveries. He'd dealt with all the routine stuff of preparations for life at Hogwarts too, such as buying school supplies and books, making friends or enemies of several other prospective first years, and failing to persuade his grandmother to divulge the secret of how pupils were placed in houses.

Apparently those who had knowledge of Hogwarts' sorting procedures and were guardians of magical children were sent a letter requesting they keep secret how the sorting occurred, and it was bothering Neville this morning, not knowing how his Hogwarts house would be sorted out. His long-term plans could be impacted by where he ended up, as it would determine the environment in which he would be learning, and those with whom he would be living alongside for seven school years. Being in Hufflepuff might offer him loyal allies, or being in Ravenclaw access to rare knowledge and great minds. Gryffindor might train him to steel his nerves, or Slytherin provide him insight into low cunning that could help him lay low his enemies. Quite a bit could depend upon which house he ended up in…

As well as about the matter of the sorting, Neville was also wondering if he'd see on the Express the strange blue-eyed blonde girl he'd glimpsed briefly in Flourish and Blotts that day at the end of July? She'd been dressed like a muggle that day, but burrowing purposefully through books of laws and the history thereof – which Neville couldn't imagine interesting a muggle-born of her age – and she'd had this kind of weird _presence_ for just a moment when she'd glanced in his direction. It had been like being looked at by a very small, girl-shaped, thunderstorm; dangerous whilst not necessarily badly so. There had been a sense that things _would_ happen around her. Then she'd glanced back at whatever it was that she'd been looking at and the moment of mad drama and high adventure had passed, and she was just another girl of about Neville's age with an odd choice in browsing material in a bookshop.

Neville _had_ surreptitiously done his best to check if her eyes were glowing pink, or to detect if there was a unicorn (invisible or otherwise) tethered up outside, but neither had proven the case, and if she _had_ been The-Girl-Who-Lived, she was there in disguise and had left her djinn attendants at home that day. Given her unusual muggle headgear, it had been impossible to see if she had _the scar_.

Still: if she _wasn't_ The-Girl-Who-Lived that _did_ increase the chance that if she were a witch that she would be attending Hogwarts; Neville could imagine The-Girl-Who-Lived being sent off to have an exotic education in distant and faraway places and not going anywhere near Hogwarts like any normal witch or wizard – even if Hogwarts _was_ probably the best magical school in Europe. And Girl-Who-Lived or not, Neville would quite like to see the girl from the bookshop again, and to find out more about her. She had just _looked_ an incredibly useful person to have around in a crisis, and Neville was sure there would be crises aplenty before his Hogwarts education was done, even if of the more mundane inter-house rivalries variety rather than anything hair-raising involving mad dark-lords or werewolves.

"All done and ready to go, Neville?" his gran intruded upon his thoughts, calling from outside his bedroom door. She was going to shrink Neville's trunk and take it to the station with her in her pocket.

Neville drew a deep breath, picked up his Hogwarts Express ticket (and the letter he had subsequently been owled containing the corrected information about the Express), and thrust them determinedly into a pocket.

"Coming, gran." he called.

Platform Three, St. Pancras, here Neville Longbottom came, ready or not…

* * *

Author Notes:

As I mentioned in my opening note, this is an alternate universe, where some characters and events have diverged from canon, quite substantially in the case of Neville Longbottom and his parents' fates. Instead of the canon situation of having parents who have been incapacitated for almost a decade, this Neville has grown up in the shadow of whispers that his parents (presumed dead) were in fact traitors, after an auror raid they were involved in went horribly wrong... This Neville is somewhat more steely, from an early age, than his canon counterpart.

I admit to taking a slight artistic liberty in imagining that if a need exists for the fabled crumple-horned snorkack to be described as 'crumple-horned', that other species of snorkack might exist which it needs to be differentiated from - and that some of them might actually be genuine. Xenophilius Lovegood being trampled to death by a common snorkack seemed to me to be an ironically appropriate way for him to go, and his demise meant his widow quit her previous employment before the accident which happens to her in canon when Luna is nine. Since this piece is generally about Neville, I won't say any more about the Lovegoods here.


End file.
